Fade
by ilysia
Summary: Already, in this Narnia that is not Narnia, Susan is beginning to fade.


**Disclaimer:** Narnia belongs to Lewis  
**Author's Note:** I've tried to write this several times before, and now that it's finally done it's not quite what I expected. Set in bookverse, for I still won't touch movieverse.

* * *

**Fade**

She sits alone at the edge of the circle of firelight, her knees drawn up to her chest and her face solemn. Her brothers and sister have tried to pull her into the dance (laughing, teasing, their eyes alight with joy and a hint of mourning) but she is firm. She cannot dance tonight, not here, not now.

Susan is back in Narnia, but it is not her Narnia, and she will not pretend otherwise.

The others feel the loss, but they love all of Narnia, every inch and every age. They mourn their time and rejoice in the new, even if they cannot be a part of it. Susan's love is more immediate; her family, her friends, her familiar places.

But these things are gone and so she does not dance.

Susan fought for this Narnia (broken, changed almost beyond recognition) because she didn't know what else to do. But it is not her Narnia (she can barely stand the pain of calling it that, calling it by the name that means so much to her) and no battles or victories will ever make it what it was.

Already, in this Narnia that is not Narnia, Susan is beginning to fade.

She dresses in the pale gowns the Narnians offer her and smiles when they tell her how lovely and gentle she looks (she remembers when she wore the color of the southern sky and wove gold through her hair and was not gentle but a queen).

She pretends not to hear when the Telmarines, those who have surrendered their hate and sworn allegiance to Caspian, look askance at her and mutter to themselves about the impropriety of women in power (Susan thinks of the treaties she made with every nation on earth; no ambassador would dare impugn her).

Tonight, she watches the dance unfold before her eyes. She cannot decide whether to laugh aloud or to weep; the choice is too great and so she does neither. She does not recognize these steps, these formal, constrained patterns. The only dances she knows are wild and sweeping and utterly free, following only the patterns of the stars and the music of the wind and sea. (Those dances have no place in this Narnia; this Narnia will have _order._)

So Susan sits and watches as the Narnians and the Telmarines try to find some middle ground, some way to live together in this world that she barely recognizes. She almost does not notice when Caspian, the new king of this new Narnia, comes and sits shyly at her side.

"Queen Susan?"

She turns, surprised to hear her name. Caspian is young (so young, did Peter and Edmund ever look so young and unprepared?) and uncertainty has settled like a mask over his face.

"Queen Susan, I wondered if you might tell me a true tale? Of the Golden Age?"

The words are out before he can stop them, and they hang tangibly in the air. Susan pauses, considering. She likes Caspian, wishes him well with his kingship, but she does not know what to offer him.

"A true tale?"

He nods, eagerness overcoming uncertainty. "Yes, your Majesty. I've heard the most wonderful stories, but I think the truth must be better."

Biting her lip, Susan looks away. He has heard stories, hero stories she's sure, of the deeds of the mighty kings and the lovely queens, of monsters and saviors and knights who always save the day and rescue the maiden. But she doesn't know any true tales like that.

She could tell him of how Lucy had been captured by pirates and then rescued bravely, daringly, by her brothers and the Narnian fleet. She could tell him this story, but how much of it? (How they all lost friends on the stormy sea and how Edmund came home nearly blind in one eye and how Lucy secreted at least two daggers on her person ever after?)

Perhaps she could tell of Edmund and his triumph over the White Witch, how he destroyed her wand and saved his brother in the process. But what should she leave out? (How Edmund blamed himself more than he could ever say and how they all nearly died and Narnia along with them and how Edmund woke screaming for years afterwards?)

Maybe she should tell Caspian the tale of Peter and how Narnia's High King spent weeks tracking a band of murderous Werewolves through Lantern Waste, how he killed their leader and made the night safe again. But in this tale, what would Caspian not want to hear? (How they spent days searching for Peter's body and when they found him he was nearly dead and how Edmund had gone so cold that he might have been stone and how all Narnia had waited in grim silence to hear if their High King would ever wake again?)

And it is possible, though she does not know, that she should tell Caspian a story of herself, of Susan, of how a foreign prince had coveted her and tried to keep her prisoner and of the war that had been fought both for her and for Narnia. But would Caspian understand? (How she had been a fool and how Rabadash's words had snared her and how Lucy had come home with flat eyes from the slaughter at Anvard?)

Caspian waits, breathless with anticipation. Susan debates, wondering what to give him. (He wants fairytales that just don't exist, stories of happiness and prosperity that he does not know are woven together with pain and sacrifice.) Caspian believes in a Golden Age without suffering, a peace without loss. Susan knows these are fictions but does not have the cruelty (or perhaps it is strength she lacks) to tear these childish ideas from him.

He is a king. He will learn soon enough.

So she turns to him in the firelight and says, "The stories are always better."

And as she walks away (a queen without a country, a girl who is a woman who is _broken_ by what has disappeared), Susan fades a little more.


End file.
